Social Networking Watch: News on the Social Networking and Social Media Industry

Cyworld Hopes To Make Comeback With Redesigned Global Service

KOREA TIMES - Nov 27 - Cyworld, once a social networking phenomenon in Korea before losing ground to Facebook and Twitter, vowed to make a comeback. Cyworld believes there still is a need for a new social network that cares less about information, and more about people and users.

See full article at Korea Times

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Cyworld's Battle With Facebook

AFP - Dec 16 - Bullying is a big problem in social networks. But South Korea's top social network Cyworld is touting several distinctive features -- including making people prove who they are in the real world before they can join their virtual one. Cyworld, founded in 2001, now has ~20M users. In June, Cyworld had 22M visits a month, Twitter 5.1M and Facebook 2.2M. Last month, Cyworld had 18M visits, Twitter 7.4M and Facebook 6.7M. Despite the trend, Korean Click, the local market research group, says it expects domestic social networks to raise their game and compete more dynamically. Cyworld is trying to do just that. Two months ago it introduced the C-Log, incorporating some features of Facebook and a Twitter-style short message service, to meet the competition. FULL ARTICLE @ AFP

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Facebook Quadruples In South Korea To 2 Million Users

INSIDE FACEBOOK - Nov 4 - South Korea was one of the four markets Mark Zuckerberg identified as top priorities for the next two years. Thanks to government policy, South Korea has the fastest broadband speeds in the world and leads other developed nations in Internet penetration. Cyworld is one of the biggest daily destinations for the country’s ~40M Internet users. Cyworld has ~16M unique visitors every month, according to Google Ad Planner, to Facebook’s ~1.7M active users. FULL ARTICLE @ INSIDE FACEBOOK

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Cyworld Shutters US Site

TECH CRUNCH – Nov 5 – Korean based CyWorld, a massive virtual world, is closing down its site in the U.S. For unknown reasons. The service was first launched in the U.S. in 2006 and is estimated to be the 12^th most valuable social network in the world, though its U.S. operations catered to only 112,000 visitors a month. CyWorld is in the process of issuing refunds for unused Acorns, their version of virtual currency. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

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Asian Social Networks Profit From Virtual Money

REUTERS -- Sep 8 -- From virtual clothes to e-pets, Asians spend $5 billion a year on virtual purchases via websites such as Qzone, Cyworld in South Korea and mobile-phone based network Gree in Japan, according to Plus Eight Star. That's about 80% of the global market for virtual products, it says. Qzone made over $1 billion last year with just 13% coming from advertising revenue. In contrast, Facebook and Myspace depend on advertising to fund most of their revenue. The evolution of virtual money in Asia is partly due to a less developed online advertising market which drove Asian web businesses to seek new ways to profit. Cultural issues are at play too. Gaming is popular among adults in Asia, whereas in the West it tends to be only for kids. FULL ARTICLE @ REUTERS

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New Site Sponsor, Viximo

SNW -- May 22 -- Viximo is a new Social Networking Watch site sponsor.  They offer a virtual goods platform suitable for social networking sites. Cyworld and QQ alone make hundreds of millions of dollars from virtual goods. Asia loves virtual goods, and Americans are turning on to them. Facebook and Hotornot are two success stories to reference in the U.S. market.  I'm told, two of the most important factors for a making virtual goods work on a site is in having  1. really great virtual goods, and  2. the right pricing and handling of money and virtual money. Viximo can help.  We're excited about virtual goods, and virtual currency and proud to have Viximo as a sponsor. As always, we vet our sponsors. No fluff is allowed on SNW. We recommend taking a look at Viximo.

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Three Japanese, Korean Virtual Worlds Generated Over $510M

VIRTUALGOODSNEWS -- Mar 31 -- Plus Eight Star Ltd's "From Virtual Worlds to the 3D Web: Online Communities In China, Asia, and the World", an EU-China Information Project, sponsored overview of virtual worlds. It contains 2008 revenue for two major Japanese and one Korean virtual goods businesses that are not online games. Together, they generated $510m through virtual goods sales in 2008.

    * Cyworld, Korea: $200m in 2008 revenues, 22m registered users, valuation unknown.
    * Mobile Game Town, Japan: $250m in 2008 revenues, 12.6m registered users, valuation $1.4 billion.
    * Gree, Japan: $60m in 2008 revenues, 8m registered users, valuation $1.2 billion.
FULL ARTICLE @ VIRTUALGOODNEWS

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This post also appears on OnlinePersonalsWatch

5 International SN To Keep An Eye On

CNET NEWS -- Dec 18 -- It's a big world out there and Facebook and MySpace don't own it.

China: Xiaonei
Xiaonei is basically a Chinese Facebook clone.

France: Skyrock
Skyrock started as a blog in 2002, which was eventually abandoned in 2007 and turned into a social network. It was the right move.

Germany: StudiVZ
StudiVZ is, well, an almost exact replica of Facebook, but without the company's signature blue design.

Japan: Mixi
Mixi controls almost every aspect of the member's profile design and structure and it doesn't even let third-party developers deploy apps on the site.

South Korea: Cyworld
Cyworld recently launched a U.S. site in an attempt to expand globally and take Facebook and MySpace on directly.
FULL ARTICLE @ CNET NEWS

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Cyworld Quits Taiwan

BRAND REPUBLIC -- Dec 5 -- Cyworld has announced it will depart Taiwan. Cyworld has stymied operations in the market by laying off 90%t of its staff following a drawn-out period of disappointing fiscal returns. Cyworld, a blog-based platform that allows users to create mini-homepages, launched in Taiwan in 2006. It currently has operations in South Korea, China, Japan, Taiwan and the US and plans to expand to Europe, South America and India. FULL ARTICLE @ BRAND REPUBLIC

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Cyworld Losing Luster To MySpace, Facebook

KOREA TIMES -- Sep 24 -- Not so long ago, Cyworld was the place to go for Korean Internet users, undoubtedly the most successful subscriber-based service ever with 20m plus members. However, as the more sophisticated Internet users started moving off to blogs or other community sites with cooler features, updating a Cyworld page is now about as popular as wearing white socks with black shoes. SK Communications, the operator of Cyworld, introduced a new version of Cyworld, dubbed "Home 2'' last year, but drew minimal response. The service, now renamed "Cyworld Blog'' had attempted to find a hybrid between social networking services and personal blogs, or Internet diaries that are the trend of the moment. FULL ARTICLE @ KOREA TIMES

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Many 'Friends' To Be Made Online, But What About $$?

THE CS MONITOR -- July 25 -- MySpace claims 73m users in the U.S. and Facebook has 37m, according to ComScore. "It's been a huge disconnect between traffic to SNS and revenue," says Debra Williamson, an analyst for eMarketer. "People are not particularly interested in clicking on the ads," says Mr. Brooks, who as editor of socialnetworkingwatch.com has followed the online industry for a decade. "Advertising needs to evolve, and social networks are forcing this change. People are really tired of being assaulted by ads, but they still love to buy." Two social network sites in Asia – qq.com, with 300m users in China, and cyworld.com, in South Korea – promote the buying and sending of on-screen items that can decorate a user's own home page or be sent as a gift to a friend. "It seems to be a distinctly Asian concept," Brooks says. Other ideas include selling online games or charging for different levels of access to a site. FULL ARTICLE @ THE CS MONITOR

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CrunchBase Information

Facebook

MySpace

Cyworld

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Muvee And Cyworld Partners

E MEDIAWIRE -- July 18 -- muvee Technologies, the automatic video editing provider, and Cyworld, South Korea's largest social network, announced a new video editing service for Cyworld members. It will allow consumers to add music and unique styles to their videos and photos and create emotionally engaging muvees to share with their online friends and family. Cyworld users will ultimately have access to hundreds of online editing styles, which they can use with Cyworld credits called dotoris to automatically create muvees and then easily display on their mini Hompy (Home Pages). FULL ARTICLE @ E MEDIAWIRE

Mark Brooks: Cyworld is the most profitable major social network (South Korea) with $10 revenue per user in 2007.

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CrunchBase Information

Cyworld

muvee

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Cyworld Sells 300 Million Songs

KOREA TIMES -- June 9 -- Cyworld said that it has sold 300m songs after six years of service, adding 100m in only one year. Music has become an inseparable part of young Koreans' online life, the company says. Cyworld charges 500 won ($0.5) for a song, meaning it has garnered over 100 billion won from the music business since beginning the service in July 2002. It did not confirm the exact revenue from its music business. FULL ARTICLE @ KOREA TIMES

Mark Brooks: Cyworld is extremely good at extracting money out of its users.  It generated $10 per active user last year.

CrunchBase Information

Cyworld

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Social Networking Embracing Search Engines, Games

KOREA TIMES -- May 19 -- The wall between social networks and portals is being taken down. Cyworld, the largest social network in Korea with more than 22m users, is evolving to provide Web search and news services on their top pages. Cyworld uses the Empas search engine, which is owned by SK Communications. Portals are not the only ones embracing the social-networking concept to improve profitability. Audition, is an online game where the users control their characters to dance to the tune of Korean and Western pop songs in groups. FULL ARTICLE @ KOREA TIMES

Mark Brooks: Cyworld is the most profitable large scale social network in the world. They make $10 a year on each active member.

Friendster Growing Fast

CNET NEWS -- Mar 31 -- According to latest ComScore data, Friendster is the 8th largest Web site on the planet and the 3rd largest social network in terms of traffic. In the last two months, Friendster moved from 12th place to 8th place, passing: Tencent (operator of QQ.com in China), Cyworld, NHN Corporation (operator of Naver, the top Korean Web portal) and Hi5. Over the last three months, Friendster grew a total of 8.7m uniques, or 31% -- more than any other social network. FULL ARTICLE @ C NET ASIA

Asia's Top Social Networks

READWRITE WEB -- Mar 30 -- Facebook has almost no presence in China, South Korea and Japan. In China, QQ dominates by far with 300m active accounts, Cyworld has close to 20m in South Korea while Mixi has 14m in Japan. Notably, QQ had 523m USD in revenues in 2007 and 224m operating profit, with only 13% coming from advertising. QQ and Cyworld make most of their money from digital goods - from background music to personalization, avatars or casual games. FULL ARTICLE @ READWRITE WEB

Cyworld Pulls Out Of Europe

KOREA TIMES -- Mar 7 -- Cyworld has failed to win German Internet users. It was difficult to overcome the cultural barrier in Germany and the operation costs were high, the firm said. Cyworld is the most popular social network in South Korea (20M members). It has pioneered since 1999, years before Facebook and MySpace appeared in the United States. SK Communications spent 5.2 billion won setting up Cyworld Europe, a joint venture with Deutsche Telekom. The Korean company held a 50.2% share. "The emergence of Myspace's German language service was the biggest blow to Cyworld there", said firm's spokeswoman Shin Hee-jung. FULL ARTICLE @ THE KOREA TIMES

Social Network Sites Battle to Befriend US Teenagers

FT.COM -- Dec 20 -- At seven years old, Cyworld is a veritable veteran in the world of social networking. A dominantforce in South Korea, where ~90% of under 20s are believed to be members, the website is now looking for eyeballs in other parts of the world. At first Many people have two to four social networking sites, says Michael Streefland, director of marketing for Cyworld. "There is a site for the real you, a rite of passage site that you would join during a particular phase of your life, and the fun, hot, new trend site," Mr Streefland says. "We have had a really big year this year," says Chris DeWolfe, MySpace's CEO. "We are very conscious about what constitutes a great experience. [co-founder] Tom [Anderson] still talks to hundreds of users every day. Any ideas we have come from our user base," he says.  Sites risk driving users away with over-commercialisation. To this end, most sites are limiting the amount of advertising, and other sources of revenue such as deals with mobile phone operators or e-commerce – 80% of Cyworld's income in South Korea – are being pursued. FULL ARTICLE @ FT.COM